Navy's Kraffen



Navy's Kraffen is one of two versions of the story of the Controverse, released as a book alongside the TV show Arc's Kraffen on May 26, 2016. The story was split into two different versions due to differences in how creators Arctic and Navy wanted to tell the story.

Navy's Kraffen is split into 2 parts, with the first part focusing mainly on the drug problem in Kraffen. Part 1 of Navy's Kraffen centers around Marley Quarrel, the scientist Wesley Coraham, military commander Grant Rene, and their involvement in the oramania drug trade.

Please click here for a detailed exploration and history of the world surrounding the story.

Prologue
N/A

Chapter 1: No Oasis
A man woke up at 11:15 PM on a cold October night in late 1970, in Kraffen, Krobia. He got up from his sleeping bag on the floor of his cold apartment and quickly got up upon checking the time and realizing that he was running late for his job.

Marley Quarrel did not have a normal job in Kraffen. The average man would be working the register at Crop Corp or doing mind-numbing work at an office at Rainco Tech, but Quarrel preferred something a little more interesting.

There was an old, abandoned military bomb shelter out in the woods built into the obscure government-protected Karma Hill that Marley had re-purposed as a drugstore months before. He sold all sorts of products, just about anything that he could get his hands on. Before quitting his job there, Marley had worked as a janitor at the Kraffen Hospital, where he stole a large amount of equipment and chemicals for his supply at his new shop. He wasn’t a cook himself, no- he never really got the hang of chemistry nor had any interest in it. His shop was an essential cornerstone for the oramania trade in Kraffen.

Marley arrived outside of the store and watched the old neon “The Oasis” sign flicker. The colorful sign, however, did not reflect the contents of the bunker. The entrance was a large steel blast door designed to protect the shelter from a nuclear explosion. The shelter was windowless and the walls were made of steel. Dirt poked through the cracks in the walls and ceiling and was piled up in the corners of the main room. It was a large shelter but the only room in the building that was at all accessible was the main room, all the other rooms would only open up in the event of a nuclear attack.

He turned the valve on the blast door and pushed it open with all his might. He walked in and hung his coat on a rack that had been hastily nailed into a split part of the wall when he first began utilizing this old place. The room felt ominous and quiet, as always. Like he wasn't supposed to be here.

It sure was a strange sort of quiet.

“Quarrel.”

Marley spun around and whipped out a handgun. “Whoa, holy crap! Who was that?!”

A pull-cord light was turned on above the transaction counter on the other side of the room. “Take a seat,” said a young man, who was already sitting down with a gun pointed directly at Marley’s head. “Drop the weapon.”

Marley kept his gun pointed at the young man. “Who do you think you are? Get out!”

The man spoke with a clear, quiet voice. It sounded like a low growl. "Quarrel, there is no use hiding any longer. I am Grant Rene, commander of the military. And this," he said, indicating the room, "is an old military-operated bomb shelter. I expect you to sit down and drop the weapon right now!” The commander stood up, cocked his gun and pointed it directly at Marley’s head.

Marley gasped and threw his handgun to the side, then proceeded to sit down with his hands raised. He got a closer look at the commander, who had an intimidating appearance. He had a dark gray head of messy hair and eyes that were simply too dark for Marley to make out the color. Instead of wearing a typical camouflage uniform, he appeared to be wearing some sort of heavy-duty black armor. An assault rifle hung on his back and a military combat knife hung at his side. He had a utility belt with all kinds of strange, unidentifiable weapons and tools on him.

“Very good. Now you see, we have been watching these activities of yours for months. We know everything about this operation. The average amount of customers you get daily, their names, where they live, drug history, and where their labs are,” Grant said calmly.

“Just arrest me already,” Marley snarled.

“If you do not cooperate with my demands then I am going to have to,” the commander responded.

“What do you want from me?” asked Marley.

“I need this..." Grant looked around, seemingly trying to find the words to explain to himself what exactly he was looking at. "...'drugstore' free of oramania. Every little grain. I think you will find that it is in your best interest, too."

Marley stood still and felt dumbfounded. Never once in his life had he seen anything like this, or heard of anything like this happening to anybody. His mind felt numb with fear and nervousness that his life was falling apart. And this man, this completely random stranger, was requesting him to miraculously clean up every grain of ora in this store. "How?" was all he managed to spit out.

“Oramania has some interesting properties that makes it stick out from any other drug or mineral known to man. Here, hand me that tool over there, please?” He pointed at an unidentifiable tool he had left on the other side of the counter.

Marley slowly stood up and walked to the other side, eyeing the soldier's handgun still, and slid the strange tool to him. Grant took the tool and outstretched a rod from it, and pressed a button. Marley jumped as the lights in the room flickered off, and tiny grains of oramania began to light up in a bright purple color. Grant pressed the button again and it all stopped, and the room’s lights flickered on again.

“What the hell was that?” Marley looked

“Oramania detector. The drug attracts electricity and will brighten up when charged with it.” Grant explained.

“Now," he said, handing Marley a small rectangular object from his belt, "we will vacuum it all up.” He pressed a button and a tube extended from the object.

“Yeah, man, thanks for the science lesson! Appreciate it!" Marley said sarcastically.

A very subtle smile of amusement formed on Grant's face. “Oramania has some interesting properties. Some of these properties are dangerous ones that I would rather not be exposed to, and I certainly would not want the public exposed. Please go grab some face masks from your supply."

“Whatever you say, man,” said Marley unenthusiastically.

The two of them worked at vacuuming up all the oramania until there wasn’t a single speck to be seen anywhere in the room. They vacuumed the walls and ceiling, sometimes having to stand on each other’s shoulders. Grant worked both himself and Marley to the bone until there was nothing left to vacuum. Marley noticed that the commander would also sometimes spend long amounts of time staring at the wall or scrubbing other kinds of dirt off the walls needlessly.

“Preparing for the apocalypse, huh?” asked Marley jokingly.

“Alright, I do not see any more. We are done here.”

“Awesome. So I’ve been meaning to ask you something," said Marley.

"What is it?" asked Grant.

"So...you’re the commander of the military, right? Where are your, like, guys at?” Marley asked.

“I cannot let them know about what comes next,” said Grant.

Marley glanced at him. “What?”

“Get moving.” Grant put his hand on Marley's back and guided him out the blast door. The commander shut the large blast door behind them.

The two of them walked a few miles in silence until they reached a large stone fortress hidden away in the woods. In large cement letters, the word SIREN was engraved on a stone block.

Marley looked at the fortress. “Where are we?”

“Fort SIREN. Large military fortress that was active during the Kraffen War. Just me and my partner working here.”

“Just you and some other dude, huh?” Marley said, eyeing Grant suspiciously. "None of your other military friends are here?"

"The fort is retired, of course not. You would not find this on a map if you were to look.

Inside the fortress, the ground was dirty and trashed with chunks of the wall that was falling apart and a bunch of litter and rusted war machinery. There was a fire pit in the center of the grounds with an old unidentifiable war automobile with the rubber on its wheels burned out sitting next to it.

“Well, where’s your guy?” Marley asked.

“Not out here.” Grant gripped the grate of the fire pit and lifted it off, revealing a long ladder reaching far down below the earth. “All of these old fortresses came equipped with underground bomb shelters. Nobody knows about these but the military. Go on, then.”

Marley gulped and slowly descended down beneath the ground, occasionally finding a missing bar on the ladder. He noticed that Grant seemed to know the steps by heart and wasn’t having any trouble climbing down. Once they reached the bottom, Grant flicked a light switch and a dim yellow light came on, revealing a large tunnel with several rooms off to the side, each with its own number and its owner’s name engraved onto a sign.

“We will be going through here,” Grant said, forcing a lever to a door open. This room’s sign was labeled “Porter Rene”.

Inside, a man in a lab coat was working with his back turned to the others, bent over a table and slowly moving his arm around.

“Hey, friends! Sorry that I’m a tad pre-occupied here. I’ll be with you guys in a minute,” the man said.

“Understood,” Grant said.

“So have you given him the scoop yet, Grant?” the man said, turning his head back a bit to look at them.

“I suppose I should,” the commander sighed. “What we are doing here is not within our legal rights and you must keep everything you see down here quiet.”

“Uh...what? I thought you said you were military?” asked Marley.

“Have you ever consumed oramania?” the commander asked Marley.

“Well, uh, not yet,” said Marley.

“It has several dangerous properties. So many that they are not all documented yet. Scientists are still running experiments and trying to determine what exactly it does to the body,” explained Grant.

“That sounds bad,” said Marley.

“These dangerous properties include the ability to give those who consume the drug extreme durability, numbed senses, etcetera. It is a weapon that I wish to optimize and utilize for the military,” Grant continued. “It could make us virtually invincible. Our fathers just barely won our last major war. This drug will transform our soldiers and, by extent, our country.”

“Holy shit. That’s crazy,” said Marley.

“What with the current cold war with Arkany, I believe it is necessary,” Grant said. “This country cannot afford to lose more soldiers if another war were to happen.”

“So that’s why we’re here,” said the man in the lab coat, finally turning around. “I'm doing the chemistry. I have stay here with my work and, of course, Grant has his military duties. Wesley Coraham, by the way,” he said, extending his hand to Marley.

"Uh, sorry to be rude but...why am I here, again?” Marley asked, shaking Wesley’s hand.

“Well, you see, we need somebody to pass the drug around,” Wesley said. “We don’t have anything else to experiment on reliably, so you’re going to be selling some of this to the druggies in the area, and try your best to document the results.”

“Cool...so they, like, don't care?” Marley asked.

Wesley shrugged. “Most of them practically need the stuff to live at this point. If anything, I think we're doing them a favor.”

“You would get your 33% cut, of course. Quite a lot of money for a man like yourself, perhaps you can get out of that apartment of yours,” said Grant. “So what do you say, Quarrel?”

“Just call me Marley, man,” Marley said. “And yeah, whatever, plan makes sense. Hope it works out.”

“Don’t question it, man. You have no idea what was going through my head when he went to recruit me. Remember that, Grant?” Wesley asked.

“I had to be more subtle with you, Marley, I apologize,” Grant said.

“It’s fine. What should I do about The Oasis?” Marley asked.

“Never return to it. My soldiers have already gone through the place. It is now on military watch,” Grant said. "Apologies, I understand that this may come as a disappointment to you.

“...Nah, it's alright. When should I start?” asked Marley.

“Right now. It’s only 1 AM, you have all night to make a few sales,” Wesley said.

“Here,” Grant said, handing Marley a medium-sized bag full of oramania. “That is a pound of oramania. The whole pound is worth about $5080. Try not to sell it all at once, try to spread it out between customers.”

“Got it,” said Marley, beginning to climb up the ladder. “Nice meeting you, Wesley. Hey, we’re not going to be doing this for too long, are we?”

“As long as it takes to perfect the recipe,” Wesley said, deepening his voice at the end to mimic Grant. He smiled. “Nice meeting you too, brother.”

Marley ascended the ladder back out into the world, oramania tucked inside his shirt and a blade in his pocket, and walked outside the fortress towards the city.

A young man with hastily combed-back brown hair ran through the halls of Kraffen’s famed research facility, Rainco Tower, with a plastic bag of oramania in his hand. He was wearing a stained, gross business suit and his clip-on tie was coming loose. He bumped into a few people who simply rolled their eyes at him - he was well-known around the building as the company lunatic. He was well educated in the fields of mechanics and technology, and was somewhat obsessed with his job as an oramania effects researcher.

The man burst through a door into a large room with a stage, an enormous screen, and a big audience. There was already somebody else making a speech and showcasing some sort of unidentifiable and neatly put together machine to the crowd. The man ran up on the stage and watched as everybody turned their heads to him. He waited impatiently for the other person to finish up his speech, and audibly groaned when the other man began to stutter nervously.

“Just give me the lectern, Paul,” the man said.

“H-hang on a second, just let me finish this up-” Paul said.

“Paul,” the man said. “This can’t wait! This is important!”

Paul reluctantly stepped away from the lectern and watched, annoyed, as the other man grabbed the mic and started his speech.

“Hello everybody,” he said. “My name is Claus Armstrong, I am a researcher of the dangerous properties and effects of the most recent infection to plague our streets. Oramania.” He held up the bag for the audience to see.

He waited in silence for some kind of reaction from the crowd that he didn't get. It was becoming evident that the people of Rainco Tech were beginning to become fatigued of him.

“This is the first sample of pure oramania that we’ve been able to get our hands on. Having this sample and understanding its effects will no doubt start us down the path of eradicating this disease from this wonderful city of ours. Any questions?”

The people in the crowd remained largely silent, with a few murmurs of conversation sprinkled in the audience. Finally, a man requested to take hold of the audience microphone.

“Uh, where’d you get the sample?” the man asked.

“Straight from the military, about half an hour ago! They entrusted us to handle it,” said Claus.

“And they gave it to you specifically? Is there any more?" asked another man.

“Apparently somebody who worked at the place they got it had some kind of foresight to their arrival, because it was apparently clean by the time it was raided," Claus said. “But it was undoubtedly the main source of the drug. Well, any other questions? No? Well, here’s the other thing.”

He went over to the side of the stage, did some tampering with a hidden wall projector, and an image of a map of Kraffen was projected onto the screen behind the stage. Certain streets were highlighted on the map.

“These are the drug delivery routes of Kraffen," Claus said. I’ve been looking these routes over recently and it all comes together perfectly, except for one thing."

He pointed at a highlighted route that stretched out into the woods.

"There’s a path that leads off into the forest, which we now know is because it points directly to The Oasis drug store,” he said. “But the thing is, that was just a store, not a laboratory. And according to some of the soldiers who raided the shop, it was selling all sorts of products, not just drugs - gas masks, lab equipment, chemicals, you name it."

Another man spoke into the audience microphone. "Where’s it coming from? Have you found a lab?"

The people in the crowd began to speculate amongst themselves about that particular question.

“Well, we don’t know where exactly the laboratory is, but I think we have a good idea of where the supplies are coming from," said Claus, gesturing to the Kraffen Hospital on the map.

"Hang on," said Paul from behind Claus. "You're accusing a state hospital of supplying criminals with drugs? That's a lawsuit waiting to happen."

“No, Paul, of course not. God!" Claus spluttered out before turning back to the mic. "So! It would seem to me that at least one or more workers at this 'Oasis,' as they called it, might have worked at the hospital. Or might still, who knows!"

"Any idea who it might be?" asked somebody from the audience.

"Nope, not yet. I'm looking into getting permission to investigate the hospital staff myself," said Claus.

“Shouldn’t that be left to the authorities?” asked another man from the audience. “No offense, but your track record isn’t particularly impressive-”

“No, no. This is a brilliant opportunity to make use of our resources and show the media what a brilliant team we are!" said Armstrong excitedly. "We leave this to the police, then we get no publicity and no credit for our findings. You know how they are, based on...uh...past endeavors."

“Ahem,” said Paul loudly. After a moment of being stared at, he whispered “The mic, Claus.”

“Well, I guess that’s all from me, if nobody has more questions,” said Claus. “I’ll keep you all up to date on the situation. Stay tuned, you all!”

Everybody in the audience stood up and left the area. “No!” Paul called over the mic. “Come back! I wasn’t finished! Damn it, Armstrong!”

“Paul, no offense, but nobody’s going to care about your ‘internet’,” said Claus, walking out the door.

He left the building slowly, thinking about his investigation. He didn’t get much recognition for his contributions to the company. He was excited to finally make it on the news for his genius inventions and finally doing some good for the world. As he was walking out the door, he heard a voice.

“What’s up?” asked the mysterious man. His face was hidden by a black hood.

“Hey, how’s it going?” Claus asked casually as he slid into his company car.

“You look like you’ve had a long day, man,” asked the other person.

“Heh, you have no idea,” said Claus as he started the car.

“Believe me, man, I know how that is,” said the man with a sigh. “Took me years to find a way to relieve myself.”

Claus lifted an eyebrow and muttered, “Most people figure that out when they’re still kids.”

“No, not like that. What if I told you there was a substance that could take away the pain and make you feel invincible? What would you say?” asked the hooded man.

“You mean, like, vodka?” asked Claus.

“Hey man, don’t go try and make this hard on me. What I’m sayin’ is, you up for the purple stuff?” asked the other man.

“The purple stuff?” asked Claus.

“Yeah. Y’know...oramania?” asked the man.

Armstrong coughed to stifle his gasp and his hand began twitching uncontrollably. “Y-yeah, sure! Where do I get some of ‘the purple stuff’?”

“Uh, I got some right here, man,” said the man. “You got some place to be?”

“I need to g-go home to, you know, get my wallet! For the purple stuff!” said Claus. “Where should we m-meet?”

“Well, I got a bag right here,” said the man, holding up a bag of oramania. "You could just come back here, c'mon, ain't like anybody's out here looking in this weather.

Claus looked around. “Uh...I’d prefer we d-do this out...somewhere else. Like...in the forest, maybe?”

“Hey man, listen, I get it. You don’t want to meet out here in the public eye. Fine...say we meet up around this time tomorrow out by the old Panto Creek?” the man asked.

“Sounds g-good, see you then!...man?” said Claus, who quickly backed out and knocked over a trash can on his way out of the parking lot.

The man watched Claus head off, then walked over to the nearest phone booth, and dialed a number.

There was a moment of shared silence between the hooded man and the person on the other end. Without saying a word, the man on the other side seemed to know who was calling.

“Did you make a sale?” asked Grant.

“Yeah, I got a guy in a parking lot,” said Marley. “We’re going to meet up this time tomorrow at the old creek in the forest.”

“Excellent,” said Grant. “You have a long and successful career ahead of you with that kind of quick salesmanship. Great job, Marley.”

The commander hung up the phone. Marley stood in the phone booth for a second and looked around him, watching the heavy rain beat down on the roofs around him. Lightning crackled as he contemplated the future of his city.